Global Voices Online

Eric Fruteau, a member of the General Council of St-Andre, a town in La Reunion, complains (Fr) about the lack of transparency and accountability in the subsidies budget distributed by the town to local associations: “It is abnormal that 5 (…) associations (…) receive 35% of (…) the budget. (…) Especially when there exist 150 associations in Saint-Andre potentially eligible for the subsidies!”

Puerto Rican blogger Eugenio Martínez Rodríguez contemplates (ES) the potential influence of the Wikipedia on the Spanish language.

Francis Wade examines the feelings invoked by the sight of bra-less women in Jamaica and tries to figure out the rationale behind the eschweing of foundation garments.

Says Senegalese blogger Seckasysteme (Fr): “African football is not up to par and its presence in the World Cup is mostly symbolic. Too bad that the numerous individual African talents could not orchestrate a comeback. (…) Why couldn't such talented African football players achieve the same performance in their national teams as they did in their respective clubs?”

Jamaican Francis Wade addresses the “remarkable inner journey” one embarks upon on returning to one's homeland, and discusses some of the tools that have helped him along the way.

Simone Champagnie announces the inaugural Caribbean Literary Festival, set to take place in Antigua in November 2006.

“Unless there is a drastic, drastic change in Aruba's economy and politics, we are simply not ready to go about it our own,” writes ArubaGirl, in a post prompted by a Bermudian blogger's musings on the subject of independence.

France-based Togolese bloggerKangni Alem writes (Fr): “Even though modesty is not Brazilian singer Caetano Veloso's forte, he has great talent as an agitator. He also exhibits phenomenal memory in the intellectual autobiography that was prompted by the New York Times to recount the birth of the artistic and musical movement of tropicalismo, the hybrid and revolutionary pop to which his and (…) Gilberto Gil's names remain attached.”

Konstantin Dlutskiy of Russian Marketing Blog writes about the cartoon character Cheburashka, its creator Eduard Uspenskiy and a new finding that claims that Cheburashka “actually did exist in reality.”

Sean Guillory discusses (and recommends) an article by Anne Neistat, a researcher for Human Rights Watch, on her recent trip to Chechnya's capital Grozny.

Brigid of Laughter in the Dark post a moving story about sharing family histories with Katia, an archive employee in Smolensk.

An angry comment forces the beatroot to continue an endless debate on whether life was better during communism.

Hugo Chavez plans to visit Belarus at the end of July, reports TOL's Belarus Blog: “Finally, the two outspoken haters of U.S. will meet. I am sure they have a lot of things to discuss, and I assume some spicy joint anti-Washington statements will be made during the visit.”

DoZ catches Pyaasa, a movie made in 1957 and wonders, “There is no three-point program to improve the sum total of the hero’s happiness in fifty-five minutes. When you make your life that deterministic, the risk of unhappiness only seems to go up.”

Nikita has a post on the perceived impurity of women during their menstrual cycle. No access to places of worship, treated as an untouchable and more.